AMBA awards scholarships to MBA candidates from five continents

AMBA awards $41,500 USD in scholarships to MBA candidates from five continents

AMBA (The Association of MBAs) has awarded more than $41,500 in scholarships to five talented individuals, from five continents, starting MBAs at world leading Business Schools.

As part of AMBA’s 50th Anniversary celebrations, the organisation pledged to award $50,000USD in scholarships between six high potential MBA applicants, each from one of six continents: Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, North America, and Oceania.

AMBA’s campaign for 2017 is around sustainability and responsible management, so we asked scholarship applicants to put together a 1,000-word essay about how they plan to use their MBA to promote the global sustainability agenda upon completion of their MBA qualification.

AMBA received more than 370 entries to the scholarship and these were judged by an esteemed panel of industry leaders, comprising Amy Jadesimi, CEO of Lagos Deep Offshore Logistics Base (LADOL), Shireen Atassi, founder and Chief Executive of The Atassi Foundation, Professor Bodo B. Schlegelmilch, Chair of the Institute for International Marketing Management at WU Vienna University of Economics and Business and founding Dean of WU Executive Education, and Andrew Main Wilson, Chief Executive of AMBA.

So far, AMBA has awarded five of the six scholarships and the winners are as follows:

Europe

Thaddaeus Velz (Germany) will complete his MBA at Mannheim Business School (Germany).

Thaddaeus is a biotechnologist and in his submission, he wrote: ‘I want to combine my profound biotechnological knowledge and expertise with my management and leadership skills. Throughout the last nine years, during my studies, and in my current job, I have gained great experiences and diverse insights into many different healthcare companies. My aim is to found a whole new type of socially oriented healthcare company. Thus, it is essential for me to improve my knowledge of economics and business administration with an MBA.

‘Working as a consultant in the healthcare sector, I gained profound expertise of processes and procedures in manufacturing companies. I gained insight into different companies in the healthcare sector and was involved in many optimisation projects, implementation projects, and decision processes. I experienced the constant competitive pressure and agility of efficient companies and have dealt with the constant growing governmental requirements healthcare companies have to fight with. The last piece of the puzzle before I found the socially oriented healthcare company is a solid understanding of economics and business administration. This is one of my biggest motivations to perform my best in my MBA studies.’

North America

Aparna Shrivastava (US) will complete her MBA at Said Business School at the University of Oxford (UK).

Aparna is the Co-Founder and Managing Director of LensShift, a resource hub aimed at addressing misguided development and social impact work.

In her submission, she said: ‘The social impact space has many shortcomings, and conversations about this are underway. As of now, they are spread across too many outlets and there's no cohesive narrative on the do's, don'ts, and missed opportunities on how to do better when trying to do good. For somebody coming into the space for the first time, it can be overwhelming to even know where to start. Unfortunately, this often translates into ill-informed projects that do more harm than good. To address this, we’re building the go-to resource hub for responsible social impact.

‘My work over the past several years has provided me with strong insights into the realities of the field, and complementing those learnings with an MBA will enable me to not only pursue, but also refine and create opportunities that drive impact at scale. Working towards my MBA is particularly enticing since it’s an ideal place for me to start the work of equipping, strengthening, and expanding LensShift’s sphere of influence.’

Asia

Karthik Palaniswami (India) will complete his MBA at Emlyon Business School (France).

Karthik, who has a background in project engineering, wrote in his submission: ‘I have created relationships with people in the renewable energy industry around the world.

‘I am investing upon my previous professional experiences, the conducive business opportunities that I am embarking on, and the greater leadership responsibilities that I will develop through the international MBA programme. I believe I could expand the business potential in the area of renewable energy, and influence the industry to create a positive change. With a simplified and easier to approach renewable energy solution, the need for detrimental sources of power generation will decrease.

‘This, in my opinion, will create positive values within our society that will be more sustainable, progressive with time, and will contribute to the creation of better living conditions around the globe.’

Karthik will start is MBA in September 2018.

Latin America

Ladan Sadri Pereira (Brazil) will complete her MBA at Said Business School at the University of Oxford (UK).

Before taking the MBA, Ladan worked at Odebrecht, the largest engineering and contracting company in Latin America.

After her MBA, she plans to return to a major Brazilian construction company to use critical thinking, global benchmarks, and analytical frameworks to run innovative operations and drive high-impact investment decisions. She wishes to become a role model for women in business, inspiring colleagues to pursue their dreams and eliminate prejudice.

She said: ‘Believing that the world can be a better place, I see myself continuing to break barriers and leaving a positive, long-lasting impact along my journey. I am confident that an MBA at Oxford will prepare me to pursue with confidence my ambitious career vision of leaving a legacy in the infrastructure sector in Brazil’

Africa

Godfrey Nyamande (Zimbabwe) will complete his MBA at Rhodes University Business School (South Africa).

Godfrey works on a voluntary basis for a non-profit organisation that is pioneering work on distributed and renewable energy resources in Africa.

In his submission, he wrote: ‘The plan is to drive an agenda for Distributed and Local Energy (DALE), and be the centre point for sharing ideas, technology, information, and sources of projects financing in communities. This is a project that is in its infancy and so as one of its leaders in Africa, I will need all the management skills that I can harness to be successful in my work.

‘Rhodes University’s guiding principle is that business has to be conducted ethically, taking care not to harm the environment in which the business is conducted.

‘This supports my dream of a future where African communities are empowered through the supply of energy that is controlled locally, instead of from a central grid. Centralised sources of energy have definitely failed the continent. Without reliable electrical energy, economic growth is hindered and it is mostly the poor people who suffer. This will increase the gap between the rich and poor in the society. However with emphasis on renewable energy sources, sustainable development is achievable.

‘I have decided to study the MBA degree full time. This gives me the chance to do thorough research into the feasibility and application of DALE in South Africa and Africa in general. The AMBA scholarship would go a long way in helping me to fund my MBA studies at Rhodes University.’

Andrew Main Wilson, Chief Executive of AMBA, said: ‘In our 50th year, we wanted to provide six talented and aspirational potential MBA students the opportunity to fulfil their dream of not only undertaking an MBA at one of the world’s best Business Schools, but also use that experience to make a real difference to society through a sustainability-oriented future career path.’

In the Oceania region, the scholarship competition is still open for students wishing to start an MBA in 2018. The winner will be announced in due course. For more information about this, please contact David Woods-Hale, Head of Communications at AMBA at d.woods@mbaworld.com.